


Tremble

by lucdarling



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Depression, F/M, First Kiss, Hogwarts Eighth Year, POV Draco Malfoy, Post-Second War with Voldemort, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Post-War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-18
Updated: 2017-04-18
Packaged: 2018-10-20 09:17:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10659558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucdarling/pseuds/lucdarling
Summary: He's returned to Hogwarts, alone and unafraid.(One of these things is a lie).





	Tremble

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Dresupi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dresupi/gifts).



> A birthday gift fic for Dresupi, who's gifted me with countless smiles and laughter through her Saturday ficlets and other works. Happy birthday! I hope you don't mind angst.
> 
> Any mistakes, grammatical or otherwise, are mine alone. Recognizable characters and situations belong to JK Rowling.

When Draco wakes, restless as always (like he had been running in his sleep, he never can run fast enough) he lets his feet carry him out of the dungeon, away from the castle no longer in ruins and around the well-trod grounds of Hogwarts. There are no bodies anymore, more than a half-year later.

Mostly, Draco ends up standing at the edge of the Black Lake and he stares out at the water without seeing it. The morning light is casting golden rays on everything in its path as it rises through the fog.

He stays out of the castle as much as he can, does most of his school work sitting in the Quidditch stands that he never thought he'd be near again. The library is still under repair, where half the shelves sit empty. A year with the Dark Lord, a year with Aunt Bella, and a summer spent on trial all somehow left Draco back at Hogwarts to finish schooling that seems pointless.

A flash of color against the green grass catches his eye and he shifts minutely to track it. It's Hermione, hair the color of treacle in the sun. Draco clenches his fist, nails biting into his palm and the pain is a relief from the words that rush unbidden to swell and close his throat.

She sits beneath a tree not far from what Draco thinks of as his spot. It's the matter of a few steps until he's at her side.

"Do you mind some company?" Draco asks, and she startles at his murmured question, head and wand whipping around in sync. Draco slowly takes his hands from the pockets of his robe, palms out to show they're empty.

Hermione stares at him, brown eyes thoughtful before she nods. Draco folds himself down to sit next to her. His legs shake with the effort and he wonders how long he was standing at the edge of the lake this morning.

She doesn't have a book and that's the reason he opens his mouth again.

"I'm sorry," he says, voice even quieter than before.

Hermione - he can't call her Granger ever again, not after the events that unfolded in his family home - nods sharply. "I did receive both your owls with the apologies. I don't think there's anything more you ought to say."

Draco winces, because it's a reminder that he did nothing while she was _tortured_. He stood by and watched and did nothing to stop it. Malfoys aren't helpless but he certainly felt that he was on that day. Sometimes he still feels the same, transported back to when he was terrified and helpless with her shrieks ringing in his ears. Sometimes he isn't even sleeping when he gets stuck in the memory.

The hand on his arm makes him flinch and Hermione moves it away just as quickly. Draco wishes she would put her hand back, her touch is a welcome salve he can't ask for. He's pathetically grateful it was his clean, right arm she touched.

"Draco," Hermione starts and his name on her lips is like music. "I don't blame you for your aunt's actions."

Draco wants to put his hands over his ears. He's imagined how this conversation would go, nigh on dreamed about it and now that it's come, he doesn't want to hear her absolve him of his guilt. He'll carry this weight to his grave and it's less than he deserves. (He still can't look at his left forearm.)

"You think I don't notice that your hands tremble at the dinner service just as mine do?" Hermione comments. "I don't know what you lived through, sharing your home with that madwoman and Voldemort-" Draco can't contain his full body flinch at the name. His body continues shuddering after the motion and he can't suppress a hissed breath through clenched teeth as his body jerks and spasms uncontrollably. It's a known effect that comes from over exposure to Crucio though usually it comes on in the late evening.

Hermione continues like nothing is out of the ordinary. "-it was war. War is hell, Draco."

He turns to her then, finally meeting her eyes. They're alight with anguished memories and fervent belief. Draco doesn't dare call it hope, she can't have hope for him, not now.

"You survived, Draco Malfoy. That's what's important." Her voice is firm, strong. "You can do what you want with your life now."

He's glad she doesn't say anything to trite as he's free now, because he never will be so long as he wears the brand of a murderer and he mirrors his father so closely in looks that some shopkeepers in Diagon Alley refuse to serve him.

"I don't know what to do," he confesses. It's not the first time he's said these words to her.

There was a day in Sixth Year that seems a lifetime ago, when the pressures of the Dark Lord's task had loomed before him and avoiding Snape at every turn, a moment when he had been in the library with the rest of the school occupied by the Ravenclaw-Hufflepuff game.

Hermione had come to him then, despite a choice of seating available.

Draco hadn't told her any details of his assignment, certain she was fishing for clues on that exact topic though he had said he was stymied with a problem. He let her think it was for the illness he was feigning and instead of rolling her eyes and scoffing as he expected, the young woman had dragged him out of the chair and to Madam Pomfrey for a check-up that she hadn't stayed for the results of.

He still didn't know why she'd helped him, the day it seemed like it was only the two of them in whole castle.

"I can't tell you that," Hermione answered. "Just remember that it's okay to live, Draco. Don't live in the past and let it weigh you down." She leans over and he only just stops himself from flinching. He feels a little flicker of warmth, of pride, deep inside at his non-reaction.

Draco isn't expecting a kiss, however. Her lips are a light pressure against his and before he realizes it, he's pressing back against her mouth and licking at the seam of her lips. Hermione pulls away after a minute or three, cheeks flushed a light pink that Draco finds very attractive.

"So," Draco pushes himself to his feet and stands cautiously with a hand against the trunk of the tree until he's sure his feet will hold him. "Every time I start feeling like a Dementor is nearby without there actually being a Dementor, I should kiss you?"

Hermione grins and she looks younger, the stress of war and hiding, living like a fugitive fallen away for a moment. Draco smiles back helplessly and extends a hand to help Hermione to her feet.

Draco doesn't know how the rest of this school year will go, certain that everyone will still whisper behind their hands about the choices he made before he truly understood the consequences, but he knows that it will be easier with Hermione next to him.


End file.
